Raymond Ocdol
Civil War Review

I really did not know what to expect from this movie, I'd seen the trailers and like most people I was pretty fixated on why a 2nd American Civil war was happening. The western forces of California and Texas? The Florida Alliance? A third term president of the loyalist states. Some pretty interesting choices for factions of a 2nd American Civil War and if you were thinking would dive much into this you would be wrong. Civil War is fundamentally about a civil war occurring in the modern USA, journalism specifically war journalism and the people on the ground. We follow a group of journalists as they make their way to DC. Our lead is Kirsten Dunst as Lee a war photographer, followed by Wagner Moura as Joel her college, Stephen McKinley Henderson as Sammy as their old mentor and Cailee Spaeny as Jessie as an aspiring photographer who tags along. Kirsten Dunst is quite the battle hardened pro while Cailee Spaeny's Jessie is the extremely green newcomer and a good part of the movie is Jessie learning the ropes.

Civil War Review
Raymond Ocdol
Top Games 2023

Really wised i got around to playing more this year on top of the giant backlog. Though I did play some other things besides WoW:Dragonflight. My GOTY is below plus some other highlights

Top Games 2023
Movie Review
Raymond Ocdol
Top Movies 2023

My Top 10 Movies for 2023 plus some special mentions at the end.

Top Movies 2023
Raymond Ocdol
The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and ...

It's been quite a while since the YA craze and the last Hunger Games movie but here we are 2023 and a new movie, a prequel, the origin story of the main villain. The Hunger Games series were some of the better movies to come out of the YA craze, the quality was a bit un even especially at the end with Mockingjay being split into 2 part but overall solid movies.

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes
Raymond Ocdol
A Haunting in Venice Review

A Haunting in Venice is Third movie is Kenneth Branagh's Poirot movie series, coming just a year after Death on the Nile though I think that movie got caught up in the Fox acquisition and the pandemic. Personally I thought Murder on the Orient Express was decent, Death on the Nile not so much, serviceable but not great for this third I did not have high hopes. Anyway turns out this movie is pretty good and is the best one out of the three.

A Haunting in Venice Review

oscars

Oscar Movies Pt. 2

American Sniper

I had heard quite a bit about the whole American jingoism thing that is supposed to be going on in this movie and indeed it is there but I did not think it was as heavy handed as it was made out to be. I thought this movie was alright. Cast was fine, story was alright and was interesting enough. There are a few silly things like an enemy sniper subplot but the biggest thing I took issue with the most was everyone's motivations, which ranged from noble to terrible. Chris Kyle seems to join the war with somewhat good intentions but ends up staying for pretty bad ones. I guess the movie is supposed to be about how war affects people and you see that but it defiantly draped in an American Flag.

Overall it’s a bit of hard movie to talk about without getting too political. I see the entertainment value of the movie, I see the value in Chris Kyle Achievements and I see what its trying to get at with what returning soldiers have to deal with but as much as Clint Eastwood claims the movie is anti-war it seems like its glorifying a pretty terrible war.

6/10

Imitation Game

I thought this movie was pretty good, The story of Alan Turing, the enigma machine and that whole operation at Bletchley place Is very interesting and defiantly deserving of being told with in a feature film with a good cast and decent budget. While enjoyed the film I feel I would have liked it more if I had not known about the Bletchley place/enigma machine/code breaking thing that went on during WWII from documentary's. The documentaries I have seen did not really touch much on the individuals but the mechanics of the enigma machine , the big "a ha" moment and the aftermath I already knew so those moments did not have as much impact.

Benedict Cumberbatch did a great job as Alan Turing walking the tight rope between crazy and brilliant. Supporting cast was pretty good, Charles Dance was menacing as always, the other code breakers were pretty good and Kiera knightly was good as well even if she looks nothing like the person she was portraying. Its not perfect there are a few too many contrived scenes and there are 1 or 2 subplots that are a bit silly. Overall it’s a solid movie, definitely worth your time.

8/10

 

 

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